Isotopes of fluorine
Fluorine (9F) has 17 known isotopes, with atomic masses ranging from 14F to 31F (with the exception of 30F), and two isomers (18mF and 26mF). Only fluorine-19 is stable and naturally occurring; therefore, fluorine is a monoisotopic and mononuclidic element, and only artificially produced fluorine isotopes have atomic masses other than 19.
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Standard atomic weight Ar, standard(F) |
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The longest-lived radioisotope is 18F; it has a half-life of 109.739 minutes. All other fluorine isotopes have half-lives of less than a minute, and most of those less than a second. The least stable known isotope is 14F, whose half-life is 500(60) × 10−24 seconds,[2] corresponding to a spectral linewidth of about 1 MeV.
List of isotopes
Nuclide[3] [n 1] |
Z | N | Isotopic mass (Da)[4] [n 2][n 3] |
Half-life [n 4] |
Decay mode [n 5] |
Daughter isotope [n 6] |
Spin and parity [n 7][n 4] |
Natural abundance (mole fraction) | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Excitation energy | Normal proportion | Range of variation | |||||||
14F | 9 | 5 | 14.03432(4) | 500(60)×10−24 s [910 keV] |
p | 13O | 2− | ||
15F | 9 | 6 | 15.017785(15) | 1.1(0.3)×10−21 s [1.0(2) MeV] |
p | 14O | 1/2+ | ||
16F | 9 | 7 | 16.011466(9) | 11(6)×10−21 s [40(20) keV] |
p | 15O | 0− | ||
17F | 9 | 8 | 17.00209524(27) | 64.370(27) s | β+ | 17O | 5/2+ | ||
18F[n 8] | 9 | 9 | 18.0009373(5) | 109.739(9) min | β+ (96.86%) | 18O | 1+ | ||
EC (3.14%)[5] | 18O | ||||||||
18mF | 1121.36(15) keV | 162(7) ns | IT | 18F | 5+ | ||||
19F | 9 | 10 | 18.9984031629(9) | Stable | 1/2+ | 1.0000 | |||
20F | 9 | 11 | 19.99998125(3) | 11.163(8) s | β− | 20Ne | 2+ | ||
21F | 9 | 12 | 20.9999489(19) | 4.158(20) s | β− | 21Ne | 5/2+ | ||
22F | 9 | 13 | 22.002999(13) | 4.23(4) s | β− (89%) | 22Ne | (4+) | ||
β−n (11%) | 21Ne | ||||||||
23F | 9 | 14 | 23.00353(4) | 2.23(14) s | β− (86%) | 23Ne | 5/2+ | ||
β−n (14%) | 22Ne | ||||||||
24F | 9 | 15 | 24.00810(10) | 384(16) ms | β− (94.1%) | 24Ne | 3+ | ||
β−n (5.9%) | 23Ne | ||||||||
25F | 9 | 16 | 25.01217(10) | 80(9) ms | β− (76.9%) | 25Ne | (5/2+) | ||
β−n (23.1%) | 24Ne | ||||||||
26F | 9 | 17 | 26.02002(12) | 8.2(9) ms | β− (86.5%) | 26Ne | 1+ | ||
β−n (13.5%) | 25Ne | ||||||||
26mF | 643.4(1) keV | 2.2(1) ms | IT (82%) | 26F | (4+) | ||||
β−n (12%) | 25Ne | ||||||||
β−n (6%) | 26Ne | ||||||||
27F | 9 | 18 | 27.02732(42) | 4.9(2) ms | β−, n (77%) | 26Ne | 5/2+# | ||
β− (23%) | 27Ne | ||||||||
28F | 9 | 19 | 28.03622(42) | 46×10−21 s | n | 27F | |||
29F | 9 | 20 | 29.04310(56) | 2.5(3) ms | β−, n (60%) | 28Ne | 5/2+# | ||
β− (40%) | 29Ne | ||||||||
31F | 9 | 22 | 31.06027(59)# | 1# ms [>260 ns] | β− | 31Ne | 5/2+# |
- mF – Excited nuclear isomer.
- ( ) – Uncertainty (1σ) is given in concise form in parentheses after the corresponding last digits.
- # – Atomic mass marked #: value and uncertainty derived not from purely experimental data, but at least partly from trends from the Mass Surface (TMS).
- # – Values marked # are not purely derived from experimental data, but at least partly from trends of neighboring nuclides (TNN).
-
Modes of decay:
EC: Electron capture IT: Isomeric transition n: Neutron emission p: Proton emission - Bold symbol as daughter – Daughter product is stable.
- ( ) spin value – Indicates spin with weak assignment arguments.
- Has medicinal uses
Fluorine-18
Of the unstable nuclides of fluorine, 18F has the longest half-life, 109.739 minutes. It has two decay modes, of which the main one is positron emission. For this reason 18F is a commercially important source of positrons. Its major value is in the production of the radiopharmaceutical fludeoxyglucose, used in positron emission tomography in medicine.
Like all positron-emitting radioisotopes, 18F also may decay by electron capture. In either case, 18F decays into 18O. The two decay modes do not happen equally frequently however; 96.86% of the decays are by beta plus (positron) emission and 3.14% by electron capture.[5]
Fluorine-18 is the lightest unstable nuclide with equal odd numbers of protons and neutrons, having 9 of each. (See also the "magic numbers" discussion of nuclide stability.)[6]
Fluorine-19
Fluorine-19 is the only stable isotope of fluorine. Its abundance is 100%; no other isotopes of fluorine exist in significant quantities. Its binding energy is 147801 keV. Fluorine-19 is NMR-active with spin of 1/2, so it is used in fluorine-19 NMR spectroscopy.
Fluorine-20
Fluorine-20 is one of the more unstable isotopes of fluorine. It has a half-life of 11.07 seconds and undergoes beta decay, transforming into its daughter nuclide 20Ne. Its specific radioactivity is 1.885 × 109 TBq/g and has a lifetime of 15.87 seconds.
Fluorine-21
Fluorine-21, as with fluorine-20, is also one of unstable isotopes of this element. It has a half-life of 4.158 seconds. It undergoes beta decay as well, which leaves behind a daughter nuclei of 21Ne. Its specific radioactivity is 4.78 × 109 TBq/g.
Isomers
Only two nuclear isomers (long-lived excited nuclear states), fluorine-18m and fluorine-26m, have been characterized.[2] The half-life of 18mF before gamma ray emission is 162(7) nanoseconds.[2] This is less than the decay half-life of any of the fluorine radioisotope nuclear ground states except for mass numbers 14–16, 28, and 31.[2] The half-life of 26mF is 2.2(1) milliseconds; it decays mainly to the ground state of 26F or (rarely, via beta-minus decay) to one of high excited states of 26Ne with delayed neutron emission.[2]
External links
References
- Meija, Juris; et al. (2016). "Atomic weights of the elements 2013 (IUPAC Technical Report)". Pure and Applied Chemistry. 88 (3): 265–91. doi:10.1515/pac-2015-0305.
- Audi, G.; Kondev, F. G.; Wang, M.; Huang, W. J.; Naimi, S. (2017). "The NUBASE2016 evaluation of nuclear properties" (PDF). Chinese Physics C. 41 (3): 030001. Bibcode:2017ChPhC..41c0001A. doi:10.1088/1674-1137/41/3/030001.
- Half-life, decay mode, nuclear spin, and isotopic composition is sourced in:
Audi, G.; Kondev, F. G.; Wang, M.; Huang, W. J.; Naimi, S. (2017). "The NUBASE2016 evaluation of nuclear properties" (PDF). Chinese Physics C. 41 (3): 030001. Bibcode:2017ChPhC..41c0001A. doi:10.1088/1674-1137/41/3/030001. - Wang, M.; Audi, G.; Kondev, F. G.; Huang, W. J.; Naimi, S.; Xu, X. (2017). "The AME2016 atomic mass evaluation (II). Tables, graphs, and references" (PDF). Chinese Physics C. 41 (3): 030003-1–030003-442. doi:10.1088/1674-1137/41/3/030003.
- F-18 branching ratio for positron emission vs. EC
- National Nuclear Data Center. "NuDat 2.x database". Brookhaven National Laboratory.